Possible child porn found in St. Paul school

St. Paul police are investigating "several" images of possible child pornography found on an electronic device in a St. Paul public school.

A staffer found the device with the images and alerted police Wednesday morning, a school spokeswoman said. Police spokesman Howie Padilla said authorities are investigating the images and could not say whether the images were taken here or elsewhere.

"We have no indications at this time that there was any staff involvement," Padilla said.

Police and school officials are not identifying the school or its grade levels, citing protocol with such cases where potential victims could be identified with the information.

School staffers acted appropriately in reporting the images, Padilla said.

St. Paul schools spokeswoman Toya Stewart Downey said the images were found on a school camera missing for several months. It was recently returned, and the images were discovered when the camera was charged.

"When the [staffer] went to charge it, they found images that were disturbing to them," Stewart Downey said.

"Right now, this is an isolated incident," Stewart Downey said. "Right now, there's no indication that there's more than one person involved based on the images that were found."

Stewart Downey said it's unclear where the camera was when it was missing, who returned it and when. The camera is one of several kept at the school for staff and student use, Stewart Downey said. It's unclear whether the camera was kept in a secure location or what the process was to check it out.

Parents were not notified of the images because the incident was not a large-scale issue, such as a lockdown, Stewart Downey said. The images appeared to depict one person and school officials did not want to widely release any information that could identify that person if the person turned out to be known locally, she added.

It's unclear whether the person is a student, she said.

"We're going to wait for the police to complete their investigation," Stewart Downey said.